This article discussed the possibility of Mental Time Travel in Animals. Mental Time Travel was defined in the article as mentally thinking –or traveling- back to a past occurrence and recalling specific details. Previously, it had been argued that the function was possible only in humans, and that other animals could not mentally travel back in time. This article however looked to prove otherwise. In humans, two of the major distinct memory systems are the episodic system and the semantic system. While the Semantic system recalls individual facts about a person’s knowledge of the world, the Episodic recalls memories of personal experiences. The System that functions in episodic memory is assumed to only exist in Human brains. This Study performed tests analyzing the behavior of Scrub Jay birds in order to disprove this assumption. Clayton, Dickinson, and their colleagues argued that the Jays are be able to mentally travel back in time to previous experiences in order to recall where their food is stored and when it will begin to decompose. It was found that the Scrub Jays can form integrative memories of what was stored when and where, and can adjust their recovery attempts based on how long ago they stored their food, allowing them to recover it before it decomposes.
This research showed groundbreaking evidence for our analysis of memory functions in animals. The researches divided their findings into two options. Either the Jay can functionally recall episodic memories, and therefore they process is not unique to humans, or, the Jays have developed a mental system over thousands of years allowing them to subconsciously store the location and time of their storage as a Semantic memory, allowing them to recall it without mentally time traveling. If Option one were correct, then the idea of human uniqueness in recalling memory would be reconsidered. If option two were correct, then more studies would have to be done possibly testing different birds for the ability of mental time traveling.
The article was very interesting and very engaging. There were not an impenetrable amount of technical terms, so it was easy to read and understand. One flaw of the article was that it seemed to recall many hypotheses of previous authors, and some of them seemed to contradict each other.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6VH9-496NS6S-2&_user=10&_coverDate=09%2F30%2F2003&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=gateway&_origin=gateway&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_searchStrId=1699687397&_rerunOrigin=scholar.google&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=c4c9d5d23c444d1e5377e5181437b578&searchtype=a
The first thing that Joey did well with his review is that he explained what mental time travel meant. This is not a well-known term, so Joey did a great job in telling the readers what it meant, so we could understand the rest of the current event. The second thing that Joey did well is that he described the study that the scientists performed on the birds very well. He went step by step and he gave the reader a full and clear understanding of the study, so that the reader would know what this study meant in regards to the rest of the article. The third thing that Joey did well is that he explained what the results of the studies meant when it comes to mental time travel in animals. He explained what the results meant very well and I understood what he was trying to say.
ReplyDeleteOne way that Joey could improve his current event review is by checking it over and editing it because he had a few grammar and spelling mistakes. If he fixed these few mistakes, the review would be a lot clearer. Another thing Joey could do to improve his review would be to give a brief history of the testing of mental time travel in animals. If he added a brief paragraph on this subject, his review would become even more interesting to read.
One thing that impressed me when reading this article was learning that humans are considered the only species that can use mental time travel. I just assumed that all animals could do this and I took it for granted thinking that it was a simple task that anything in the world that has a brain could do.
John Gray
ReplyDeleteJoey’s article is good because it gets right to the heart of what I want to know. The first thing I thought when I read the title was “what is ‘Mental Time Travel’?” and the second line of his review defines it. This theme of explanation remains constant throughout the article and makes the subject matter very understandable. The second thing I liked about the review was how it explained what the scientists wanted to prove and how they set out to do that. Joey then discusses the results and what they meant. Lastly, I like how Joey mentioned the names of the scientists involved in the project. It’s good to give credit to the people who do these experiments because, as I’ve stated in previous reviews, it’s all they’ve got.
Though the review was good overall, there were a few areas on which Joey could improve. There were a few grammatical and punctuation errors in the review. While these errors might fly in a non-AP setting, they are certainly nothing to be baulked at in the AP Biology world. Another very small misstep was that Joey did not spend too much time on his problems with the article. He sort of brushed over them.
I found the article to be quite interesting myself after giving it the once over.
I like the subject of the study because I find it fascinating to try to get into the heads of other beings. It seems to ask questions about reality and perception, and that’s interesting.
There were many aspects of this review that were well presented. Foremost he explained what the interesting term and point of this article, mental time travel, really meant. This is not a well-known term, therefore it was successfully crucial that he explain this term in order for readers to comprehend the importance of this article. He also described the study that the scientists performed on the birds very well. In a specific manner, he went piece by piece and gave the reader a full and clear understanding of the study, so that the reader could once again fathom the real meaning as well as importance of the article at hand. Finally he also explained what the results of the studies meant and how they pertained to mental time travel in animals. I was clearly able to follow along with the article because of the way he was able to explain and compel the article. One possible and slightly obvious way that he could even improve his current event review is by making some editing passes over it because there were a few grammar and spelling mistakes. If he fixed these few mistakes, the review would be a lot clearer. If possible, as well a brief history of the testing of mental time travel in animals. The addition of a small historical paragraph would greatly add to the interest of this article review. It is incredible to think that humans are considered the only species that can use mental time travel. More than anything I believed that this was a normal capability of all animals and not simply an exclusive characteristically capability.
ReplyDeleteI thought Joey did a very nice job in his article review. the first thing i liked is that he made a clear and understandable summary of the article. he clearly explained the necessary information. second, Joey had a nice step-by-step explanation of the experiment. I found it easy to understand the Jay Bird experiment. Finally, I loved his analysis on the experiments impact to our knowledge of the brain or other animals. Joey made it clear that this experiment may uncover a new way of looking at the brains of other animals.
ReplyDeleteWhile the article was very strong, there were a few areas of weakness. the first small piece of criticism is proofreading. I wasn't a big issue but there were a few areas that could have used proofreading. second, I wish Joey gave us a little more information on who was doing the experiment. Yes, a name was given, but I would have liked to have seen a little more than that.
I learned a great deal from this article. Didn't realize humans have two different methods of memory. I found this to be very interesting
I thought that Joey did a number of things really well in his review. Firstly, the summary was very concise and made things easy to understand right from the start. Secondly, Joey's approach to explaining the experiment was very easy to understand and made the article impossible to put down after being started. Finally, Joey made it perfectly clear how important the experiment was for our knowledge of how animals' minds work.
ReplyDeleteThere were a few things that Joey could've have done better however. The review could have been revised in a few areas for punctuation and grammar and such. While in this particular review it did not detract from my understanding of the article, it is important to take caution with that in the future lest someone misunderstand the meaning of the review or article. Secondly and lastly, it could have been made clearer exactly who was conducting such experiments and who was doing this research so that readers might continue to look into the topic later.
I really enjoyed the review and the article and I believe that i learned some very interesting things. Most notably, the way that the human mind works in terms of memory.
First of all, I felt that Joey did a very good job in using terminology that was easy to understand. This article could have possibly been very complicated, yet Joey thoroughly explained everything so that I was not left with any questions. Joey also got across just how important this experiment was to science. I also liked how this experiment could lead to experiments and discoveries with the brains of other animals, and that this experiment does not just pertain to the Jay Bird.
ReplyDeleteAlthough I felt that Joey did a very good job with his summary, there were some weaknesses. First of all, there were a few typos. They did not really alter the quality of the summary, because there were so few, yet they were still there. Also, I felt that it would have helped supplement his summary if there was some history about previous theories or experiments involved with “mental time travel” in animals.
I thought that this article was very interesting because it had never really occurred to me that other animals could not “mentally time travel”. Therefore, I felt that this was a very interesting article that, otherwise, I would have never come across.
This is an extremely thought provoking article because not only does it propose that animals have the ability of humans to recall, through memory, special events and happenings, but also because it would open the door to the possibility of intricacies in the brains of animals that humans have yet to delve into or realize. Though we have a nearly certain grasp of how animals function, we have limited entry into how they think; limited to observational study. This would be a first contradiction that we fully understand the workings of animals brains. The article had a very interesting topic, which was presented clearly with a focus on the philosophical aspects of thought in other animals other than humans. In fact we may be breaching a barrier not previously broken through. The article also does of good job of distinguishing between the different type of memories—episodic and semantic—which makes for a more informed reader and us to distinguish whether or not this ability is more human or more evolution taking its role in survival. I agree with the review that several hypothesizes seemed to contradict each other; it would also be helpful if it were distinguished which type of memory would cause researchers greater interest or be considered more extraordinary. The article waffles saying either would be interesting, but it would be more helpful to know which people hope it is. Overall this was a good article, helpful and thoughtful review on an interesting topic. Five stars, bravo, hopefully this research allows us to better understand the thought processes and memory processes of animals past what is already known.
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